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Threat actors are selling a new crypter and loader called  ASMCrypt , which has been described as an "evolved version" of another loader malware known as DoubleFinger. "The idea behind this type of malware is to load the final payload without the loading process or the payload itself being detected by AV/EDR, etc.," Kaspersky  said  in an analysis published this week. DoubleFinger was  first documented  by the Russian cybersecurity company, detailing infection chains leveraging the malware to propagate a cryptocurrency stealer dubbed GreetingGhoul to victims in Europe, the U.S., and Latin America. ASMCrypt, once purchased and launched by the customers, is designed to establish contact with a backend service over the TOR network using hard-coded credentials, thereby enabling the buyers to build payloads of their choice for use in their campaigns. "The application creates an encrypted blob hidden inside a .PNG file," Kaspersky said. "This image mus

The North Korea-linked  Lazarus Group  has been linked to a cyber espionage attack targeting an unnamed aerospace company in Spain in which employees of the firm were approached by the threat actor posing as a recruiter for Meta. "Employees of the targeted company were contacted by a fake recruiter via LinkedIn and tricked into opening a malicious executable file presenting itself as a coding challenge or quiz," ESET security researcher Peter Kálnai  said  in a technical report shared with The Hacker News. The attack is part of a long-standing spear-phishing campaign called  Operation Dream Job  that's orchestrated by the hacking crew in an attempt to lure employees working at prospective targets that are of strategic interest, enticing them with lucrative job opportunities to activate the infection chain. Earlier this March, the Slovak cybersecurity company detailed an attack wave aimed at Linux users that involved the use of bogus HSBC job offers to launch a backdo

Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM) is a strategic framework that helps organizations continuously assess and manage cyber risk. It breaks down the complex task of managing security threats into five distinct stages: Scoping, Discovery, Prioritization, Validation, and Mobilization. Each of these stages plays a crucial role in identifying, addressing, and mitigating vulnerabilities - before they can be exploited by attackers.  On paper, CTEM sounds great . But where the rubber meets the road – especially for CTEM neophytes - implementing CTEM can seem overwhelming. The process of putting CTEM principles into practice can look prohibitively complex at first. However, with the right tools and a clear understanding of each stage, CTEM can be an effective method for strengthening your organization's security posture.  That's why I've put together a step-by-step guide on which tools to use for which stage. Want to learn more? Read on… Stage 1: Scoping  When you're defin

Most people are barely thinking about basic cybersecurity, let alone post-quantum cryptography. But the impact of a post-quantum world is coming for them regardless of whether or not it's keeping them up tonight.  Today, many rely on encryption in their daily lives to protect their fundamental digital privacy and security, whether for messaging friends and family, storing files and photos, or simply browsing the web. The question experts have been asking for a long time, with their eye on the advances in quantum computing, is, "How long before these defenses fail?"  The ticking clock of quantum computing One set of researchers is already sounding the alarms,  claiming  that they've found a way to break 2048-bit RSA encryption with a quantum computer. While the claims may be premature, they hint toward a scary future that is perhaps closer than we once thought. Breaking RSA encryption would represent a massive privacy and security vulnerability for virtually every

Malicious ads served inside Microsoft Bing's artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot are being used to distribute malware when searching for popular tools. The findings come from Malwarebytes, which revealed that unsuspecting users can be tricked into visiting booby-trapped sites and installing malware directly from Bing Chat conversations. Introduced by Microsoft in February 2023, Bing Chat is an  interactive search experience  that's powered by OpenAI's large language model called  GPT-4 . A month later, the tech giant  began   exploring  placing ads in the conversations. But the move has also opened the doors for threat actors who resort to malvertising tactics and propagate malware. "Ads can be inserted into a Bing Chat conversation in various ways," Jérôme Segura, director of threat intelligence at Malwarebytes,  said . "One of those is when a user hovers over a link and an ad is displayed first before the organic result." In an example highligh

Progress Software has released hotfixes for a critical security vulnerability, alongside seven other flaws, in the WS_FTP Server Ad hoc Transfer Module and in the WS_FTP Server manager interface. Tracked as  CVE-2023-40044 , the flaw has a CVSS score of 10.0, indicating maximum severity. All versions of the software are impacted by the flaw. "In WS_FTP Server versions prior to 8.7.4 and 8.8.2, a pre-authenticated attacker could leverage a .NET deserialization vulnerability in the Ad Hoc Transfer module to execute remote commands on the underlying WS_FTP Server operating system," the company  said  in an advisory. Assetnote security researchers Shubham Shah and Sean Yeoh have been credited with discovering and reporting the vulnerability. The list of remaining flaws, impacting WS_FTP Server versions prior to 8.8.2, is as follows - CVE-2023-42657  (CVSS score: 9.9) - A directory traversal vulnerability that could be exploited to perform file operations. CVE-2023-40045

Cisco is warning of attempted exploitation of a security flaw in its IOS Software and IOS XE Software that could permit an authenticated remote attacker to achieve remote code execution on affected systems. The medium-severity vulnerability is tracked as  CVE-2023-20109 , and has a CVSS score of 6.6. It impacts all versions of the software that have the GDOI or G-IKEv2 protocol enabled. The company  said  the shortcoming "could allow an authenticated, remote attacker who has administrative control of either a group member or a key server to execute arbitrary code on an affected device or cause the device to crash." It further noted that the issue is the result of insufficient validation of attributes in the Group Domain of Interpretation (GDOI) and G-IKEv2 protocols of the GET VPN feature and it could be weaponized by either compromising an installed key server or modifying the configuration of a group member to point to a key server that is controlled by the attacker.

A new deceptive campaign has been observed hijacking GitHub accounts and committing malicious code disguised as Dependabot contributions with an aim to steal passwords from developers. "The malicious code exfiltrates the GitHub project's defined secrets to a malicious C2 server and modify any existing javascript files in the attacked project with a web-form password-stealer malware code effecting any end-user submitting its password in a web form," Checkmarx  said  in a technical report. The malware is also designed to capture GitHub secrets and variables to a remote server by means of a GitHub Action. The software supply chain security firm said it observed the atypical commits to hundreds of public and private GitHub repositories between July 8 and 11, 2023. It has emerged that the victims had their GitHub personal access tokens stolen and used by the threat actors to make falsified code commits to users' repositories by posing as Dependabot. Dependabot  is d

Cybersecurity agencies from Japan and the U.S. have warned of attacks mounted by a state-backed hacking group from China to stealthily tamper with branch routers and use them as jumping-off points to access the networks of various companies in the two countries. The attacks have been tied to a malicious cyber actor dubbed  BlackTech  by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), Japan National Police Agency (NPA), and the Japan National Center of Incident Readiness and Strategy for Cybersecurity (NISC). "BlackTech has demonstrated capabilities in modifying router firmware without detection and exploiting routers' domain-trust relationships to pivot from international subsidiaries to headquarters in Japan and the United States, which are the primary targets," the agencies  said  in a joint alert. Targeted sectors encompass government, industrial, technology, media, electronics

The landscape of browser security has undergone significant changes over the past decade. While Browser Isolation was once considered the gold standard for protecting against browser exploits and malware downloads, it has become increasingly inadequate and insecure in today's SaaS-centric world. The limitations of Browser Isolation, such as degraded browser performance and inability to tackle modern web-borne threats like phishing and malicious extensions, necessitate a shift towards more advanced solutions. These are the findings of a new report, titled " The Dark Side of Browser Isolation and the Next Generation of Browser Security " ( Download here ). The Roots of Browser Isolation In the past, traditional signature-based antiviruses were commonly used to protect against on-device malware infections. However, they failed to block two main types of threats. The first, browser exploit, especially in Microsoft's Internet Explorer. The second, drive-by malware down

Government and telecom entities have been subjected to a new wave of attacks by a China-linked threat actor tracked as  Budworm  using an updated malware toolset. The intrusions, targeting a Middle Eastern telecommunications organization and an Asian government, took place in August 2023, with the adversary deploying an improved version of its SysUpdate toolkit, the Symantec Threat Hunter Team, part of Broadcom,  said  in a report shared with The Hacker News. Budworm , also referred to by the names APT27, Bronze Union, Emissary Panda, Iron Tiger, Lucky Mouse, and Red Phoenix, is known to be active since at least 2013, targeting a wide range of industry verticals in pursuit of its intelligence gathering goals.  The nation-state group leverages various tools such as China Chopper web shell, Gh0st RAT, HyperBro, PlugX, SysUpdate, and ZXShell to exfiltrate high-value information and maintain access to sensitive systems over a long period of time. A previous report from SecureWorks in